This invention relates to puffer circuit interrupters, and more specifically relates to a novel gas mixing plate fixed to the movable baffle and located downstream of the flow of hot interruption gas to ensure its turbulence and improved gas mixing.
Gas insulated circuit breakers use a rapid flow of gas, typically SF.sub.6, to cool the region where arcing has occurred during breaker operation. The arc is generated in the breaker interrupter during opening and successful interruption of the current flow depends largely upon this cooling. The heated gas leaving the interrupter main gap area, coming out of the main nozzle, must be cooled before it is allowed to flow into a region of voltage stress. This cooling is often accomplished by the use of a fixed mixing plate, the hot gas flowing past and around the plate becoming a turbulent flow and causing good mixing with cooler gas in its path. This effect obviously requires a relatively large volume of cool gas in the flow path that is inside the main interrupter body. A large, unused volume is needed that generally serves no other purpose.